Morrisons continues to gain market share from rivals
Supermarket giant Morrisons, which is the UK’s fourth largest, has announced better-than-expected sales figures.
The group, which continues to gain market share from other supermarket giants such as Tesco and Sainsbury’s, said the first quarter of the year saw like-for-like sales grow 7.3%, as a result of heavy discounting.
The group said it is attracting half a million new customers to its stores each week and is also benefiting from offering 8,000 price cuts under the group’s “Price Crunch” campaign.
The group, which is based in Bradford, described the results as “particularly good” and said “the board is encouraged by the progress of the business at this early stage of the year.”
In the meantime, the group has announced that from next month, 10,000 employees in two schemes will have their pensions based on their “career average” earnings, rather than their final salaries.
The schemes had already been closed to new members, who are offered a “defined contribution” pension scheme instead.
The supermarket is the latest company to have closed its final salary pension scheme to existing staff. Earlier this week, oil giant BP and Barclays said they would close its UK final salary pension scheme to new members.
In related news, the world’s largest retailer, Wal-Mart said it is embarking on a major expansion with 22,000 new jobs.
According to analysts, the news is a good sign that the retailer is trading well.
As with supermarkets in the UK, Wal-Mart has benefited from consumers cutting back during the economic downturn as shoppers seek lower prices on food and electrical goods.
Last year, Wal-Mart created more than 30,000 jobs in the US.
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